The Mad Dog
What the hell was this?
The first thing that came to mind after I left the fighting arena was Seo-yeon.
The girl I'd left at the barbecue place. Alone in front of half-burned meat, with no idea what was going on.
Park Sang-do could wait. That bastard wasn't going anywhere. He'd still be right there. But Seo-yeon was alone right now.
Go to Seo-yeon first. Pick her up, tell her I was sorry, and explain everything.
I pulled out my phone and dialed.
Ring.
Ring.
……No answer.
I called again. Once more the ring tone stretched out long and empty. She wouldn't pick up.
It was strange. There was no way Seo-yeon wouldn't take my call. She'd seen me leave looking weird, so she should have been waiting for me to contact her instead.
My steps quickened.
To the barbecue place.
I pushed the door open and went in.
Seo-yeon wasn't there.
The seat we'd shared. The meat on the grill had burned black and was sending up smoke, and only the envelope I'd set down remained exactly where I'd left it. No sign of Seo-yeon.
"Oh, it's that young man from earlier."
The owner ajumma recognized me.
"Looking for the young lady who came with you? Not long after you left she just bolted out. Must've been something urgent. She ran off yelling someone's name."
"……Which way?"
"Dunno. Just tore out of here. Her face looked real bad."
I stood there blankly for a moment after hearing that.
She'd chased after me.
Of course she had. The kid who'd shouted that my eyes looked wrong, demanding where I was going. The one who'd tried to hold on with the hand I'd gently pulled free. That same kid had run out the second I left.
Following me.
A chill settled into one corner of my chest.
Something like a bear's instinct climbed my spine. The same feeling as when you sense an invisible threat deep in the mountains—every hair on your body standing on end.
Something was wrong.
I dialed again. The third time.
No answer.
……Where did she go?
My mind raced.
She'd run out after me, but I'd smashed the office and come straight out, so we must have missed each other on the street. Then Seo-yeon lost me and went looking for places I was likely to head.
The place I'd stormed off to in a rage.
The Underground Arena.
The moment that thought hit—
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
But I knew who it was before I even answered.
I pressed the call button.
"Seo-yeon's here."
Seo Jin-woo.
It wasn't the trembling voice from a moment ago. This was the voice of a man calmly enjoying the situation.
"Come get her. Take your time if you want."
"……."
"She's not going anywhere anyway."
Click.
The line went dead.
I looked down at the crumpled phone in my hand. Without realizing it I'd squeezed so hard the screen had cracked and a corner had bent.
……A trap.
I knew it instantly.
"Take your time." That easy confidence. "She's not going anywhere." It meant something was waiting for me. A hundred out of a hundred, a snare meant for me.
Using Seo-yeon as bait.
But.
I slowly slipped the phone into my pocket.
Trap or not, it didn't matter.
Seo-yeon was there.
The kid who'd chased after me and gotten caught because of me.
That was enough.
I didn't need any more reason to go.
I started walking.
Toward the Underground Arena.
When I reached the arena entrance, a man was standing there.
Alone.
Under the streetlight I saw a familiar face.
Park Do-hyun.
The man who managed this place. The one who always grinned and drawled "Han Daewong-ssi~" with that oily Gyeongsang lilt.
He wasn't smiling now.
"……You came."
Park Do-hyun looked at me.
"Faster than I thought. Figured you'd take a little longer."
"Move."
Park Do-hyun didn't move.
Instead he pulled a phone from his pocket. It was vibrating. I couldn't see the name on the screen, but Park Do-hyun glanced at it for a second, then—
He smirked.
"Ah, so damn noisy."
He powered it off and flung it straight to the ground. The phone hit the asphalt and skittered away with a clatter.
"……The higher-ups always yappin' this and that. I told 'em I'd handle it myself."
Park Do-hyun cracked his neck side to side.
"This stays at my level."
Then he raised his fists.
Boxing stance, no openings. The oily, grinning atmosphere vanished in an instant. Those shoulders that always hunched and fawned were now low and coiled like a predator's.
……What is this guy?
It was a face I'd never seen before.
"Han Daewong-ssi."
Park Do-hyun looked me straight in the eye.
"I'm gonna ask you one thing. When you go in there, what exactly you plannin' to do?"
"……I'm bringing Seo-yeon out."
"Yeah. Figured as much."
Park Do-hyun nodded.
"But you know how many people are waitin' inside?"
"……."
"A hundred. Knives, axes, the works. Park Sang-do himself showed up."
Park Sang-do.
At that name, strength flooded into the tips of my toes.
"……Perfect."
I said it low.
"I had business with that bastard anyway."
"Ha. Yeah. Knew you'd say that."
Park Do-hyun let out a hollow laugh. But the end of that laugh was strangely bitter.
"But listen good, Han Daewong-ssi."
His voice dropped.
"Those bastards won't kill Seo-yeon. Absolute-ly not. Why? 'Cause she's proven product. You don't go smashin' something that makes money."
"……."
"You, though—you're different."
Park Do-hyun locked eyes with me.
"You wrecked the boss's office today. To them you're a rabid bear. Can't train it, can't sell it. Something like that—"
His eyes flashed.
"—you kill it and bury it. That's the law of this world."
I looked at him.
Strange man. He was clearly blocking my path, yet every word he spoke sounded like he was worried about me.
"……So?"
I asked.
"You're not standing there telling me to get out of the way. You're standing there telling me not to go."
Park Do-hyun paused for a beat.
Then he smirked again. This time it looked a little more unhinged.
"Hell if I know. Call it fifty-fifty."
He reset his fists.
"Stoppin' you from goin' in is right—and while I'm at it, I kinda wanna see if you're really that big a deal."
"……."
"If you can't even beat me out here, you're just gonna die in there."
Under the streetlight Park Do-hyun's shadow stretched long across the ground.
"Alright then. Han Daewong-ssi."
He bared his teeth in a grin.
"Try and beat me. Only then you get to decide whether you save that Seo-yeon inside or not."
I listened, then slowly raised my own fists.
I didn't know exactly why this man was doing this.
But I knew one thing.
He was standing in my way right now.
And beyond that door, Seo-yeon was waiting.
……Sorry.
I put strength into the balls of my feet.
I don't have time.
I moved first.
Park Do-hyun was fast. He twisted his torso just enough to let my fist slide past, then used the rebound to drive in close. For a human it was startling speed.
But that was all.
I casually extended a fist toward the man closing in.
Wham—!
Park Do-hyun's body lifted clean off the ground. He flew and tumbled across the pavement.
……Too weak.
It was more hollow than I'd expected. This guy had looked like he wouldn't be easy, yet one hit sent him packing.
Park Do-hyun lay sprawled and motionless. Blood ran from his mouth.
I started past him toward the arena. No time to waste.
In that instant—
Shhhk—
Something sliced the air.
A knife.
The Park Do-hyun who'd been lying there—when had he even gotten up?—no, as if he'd never gone down at all, he was already whipping a blade at blinding speed.
Ihihihihihihihi—!!!!!
The oily dialect and the fawning arena manager were gone.
This was a completely different face. Eyes rolled back, mouth stretched ear to ear, and between those teeth poured a madman's laugh.
—That's right! This is how it gets fun—!!
The knife danced.
One, two, three. Blade after blade with no openings.
Like a man possessed, Park Do-hyun laughed while he swung.
Not the honest single strike from before—feint after feint. High, low, side. The edge came from angles I couldn't read at all.
I twisted and slipped past.
One step, another step.
The tip grazed my collar. Whispered past my cheek. Paper-thin margins.
……This guy.
While I dodged, I thought.
That earlier punch—he'd taken it on purpose. He'd deliberately flown, played dead, and waited for the moment I got careless and turned my back. That quick mind and the guts to pull it off.
And this knife.
He was laughing, yet every cut aimed dead at a vital point. A raving grin on one side of the body, a cold blade picking vitals on the other. Both lived in the same man.
Mad Dog.
The words rose on their own.
"Why! Why won't you just take a hit!!"
Park Do-hyun shouted through his laughter, swinging the knife like a child throwing a tantrum.
"With that damn bear-sized body!! Why's a big bastard like you dodgin' left and right so damn well!!"
Shhk! Shh-shhk! Shh-shh-shh-shhk!!!
"Just once! Just one damn hit is all I'm askin'!! Huh!!"
Ihihihi!!! Park Do-hyun laughed. Eyes rolled, mouth stretched to tearing, yet the knife tip tracked my vitals without a single miss.
"Just once! C'mon, take a hit for me—!!"
The blade got faster.
Park Do-hyun loved knives.
More honest than fists. Stab and it goes in. Slash and it opens. No lies.
Twenty years in this world, and that single knife had kept him alive. He wasn't especially big or strong. But nobody was faster than Park Do-hyun. With that speed he'd laid out countless men bigger and tougher than himself.
So when Han Daewong threw a punch, Park Do-hyun stayed relaxed.
He turned his upper body just a little and let it slide past. That massive fist whispered by his ear. The wind it carried was heavy—heavy enough that even a graze would rattle your skull—but if it didn't land, that was all it was.
Slow—big frame and still that sluggish.
Park Do-hyun used the slip's rebound to drive straight in. The knife flicked from his coat like a snake. His specialty. The bigger they were, the more helpless they became once you got inside. One cut and it was over.
The blade drew a long line across Han Daewong's side.
It's in.
He was certain.
But.
……Huh?
The feel was wrong. Not the soft resistance of flesh parting. The edge scraped across thick hide—no, something harder still—and simply skidded.
No blood came.
Han Daewong didn't even glance at the cut side. His face said he hadn't noticed the slash at all. Less than a mosquito landing.
……What the hell is this?
A chill ran down Park Do-hyun's spine.
But he didn't stop. Stopping meant you weren't the Mad Dog. He kicked sand up from the ground with his toes. Dust exploded into Han Daewong's face.
Dirty? This wasn't the time to care about that. If it could win, he did it. That was how Park Do-hyun had stayed alive this long.
In the split second of blinded vision, Park Do-hyun drove the knife at Han Daewong's throat. A vital this time. If it wouldn't cut, he'd just shove it in.
But.
The wrist holding the knife stopped dead in midair.
……!!
Somehow Han Daewong had already seized that wrist.
Sand still covered his face; his eyes were squeezed shut. He clearly couldn't see a thing, yet that huge hand had completely swallowed Park Do-hyun's wrist.
……How?
He hadn't grabbed by sight. Not with his eyes—he'd felt him with something else. Scent, sound, the shift of air, whatever it was, exactly the way a beast in the deep mountains takes its prey in total darkness.
Han Daewong's closed eyes slowly opened.
Sand streamed down as those eyes locked onto Park Do-hyun.
They weren't a person's eyes.
Park Do-hyun had seen countless eyes in his life.
Eyes full of killing intent, eyes full of fear, eyes gone mad. He'd never seen eyes like these.
No rage. No murder. Just—the indifferent gaze of a beast brushing away something that irritated it.
……Ah.
In that moment Park Do-hyun knew.
He couldn't win this.
Speed, knives, tricks—those only worked on people. They only meant anything inside human rules.
But this—wasn't a person.
From the start he hadn't been fighting a human.
Still, Park Do-hyun laughed.
If he tucked his tail here, he wouldn't be Mad Dog Park Do-hyun.
"……I-ihihihi."
The laugh leaked out. Forcing the captured wrist to twist, Park Do-hyun bared his teeth. Eyes rolling, mouth stretching ear to ear.
"Nice. You're real scary, you. Ihihi! —But y'know."
Park Do-hyun's free hand drew a second knife from his belt.
—A mad dog is scariest right before it dies.
The second blade streaked for Han Daewong's face.
A distance that would slice an eyeball if it even grazed. The fastest single strike Park Do-hyun had spent a lifetime honing.
But.
Before that knife could even reach Han Daewong—
Wham—!!
What arrived first was Han Daewong's fist.
Park Do-hyun never even saw it coming. The world simply flashed white once, and his whole body left the ground. Like being hit by a truck. No—worse.
Even in that brief instant of flight, Park Do-hyun was still smiling.
……Ah. Good.
The wall slammed into his back and his vision bleached pure white. Then, slowly, Park Do-hyun's ruined body slid down the wall.
